Posted
by
Soulskill
on Saturday October 26, 2013 @03:23PM
from the walk-to-shore-and-scream-your-search-queries-at-it dept.

snydeq writes "CNET's Daniel Terdiman investigates an oversize secret project Google is constructing on San Francisco's Treasure Island, which according to one expert may be a sea-faring data center. 'Something big and mysterious is rising from a floating barge at the end of Treasure Island, a former Navy base in the middle of San Francisco Bay. And Google's fingerprints are all over it,' Terdiman writes. 'Whether the structure is in fact a floating data center is hard to say for sure, of course, since Google's not talking. But Google, understandably, has a history of putting data centers in places with cheap cooling, as well as undertaking odd and unexpected projects like trying to bring Internet access to developing nations via balloons and blimps.'"

Something big and mysterious is rising from a floating barge at the end of Treasure Island, a former Navy base in the middle of San Francisco Bay. And Google's fingerprints are all over it,'

It's hardly a secret guys. They were granted a patent on sea-based data centers... in 2009 [seobythesea.com]. They want to build a sea-water based data center, and given the mild seasons of California and abundance of internet peering points, this is the logical place to start.

The thing is, sea water isn't exactly computer-friendly... so they probably aren't going to get it on the first go. But the water a hundred feet down in the ocean is actually pretty cool. This makes sense... it all comes down to materials selection. Salt water is highly corrosive and they'll need something that can handle hoovering up large jelly fish and such without dying.

I assume they'd use some kind of a binary system, with fresh water in the cooling loop and pumping salt water through the heat exchangers. I don't think you'd want to rely on natural heat dissipation, as you'd need a very large radiator, and sea life would love to grow all over it.

Glycol is better in non phase change cooling loops as it has a higher specific heat. However, using cold sea water to condense refrigerants is very common. One nice way would be with Alpha Laval plate heat exchangers (or the Indian copies), and a hypochlorite generator on the sea water side to control (kill) the marine life internal to the apparatus.

For example, the Navy uses 2190 mineral oil [mil-specproducts.com] to cool the 23699 synthetic oil [everyspec.com] in the LM2500 gas turbines that move most of the fleet. The 2190 is also used to lube the main reduction gear [fbo.gov] that steps down the RPM of that LM2500 by a ratio of ratio of 21.3746 to 1 (ISTR it was 27:1 on the old Ticonderoga-class, but this is a different drive train).
The 2190 mineral oil system has a heat exchanger, trading all that lovely hotness with seawater.
The rationale for using 2190 to cool the high-performance 23699 is that, in case of a heat exchanger failure, a bit of mineral oil in the synthetic (for which the engineers test repeatedly throughout the day) is a lot less damaging than getting seawater in there.

Are there even any datacenters, power plants, or other such facilities that don't use a closed-loop (full of suitably domesticated, additive-laced, and probably unpleasant enough to be illegal to discharge in quantity, between the metal ions and the assorted biocides, coolant fluid) and then a big, durable, heat exchanger that couples the internal loop to the hostile-but-cheap cold water from the outside world?

This doesn't change the general "Oh, you want to put that on a boat... Just go back over my pri

The tsunami was caused when the Angels first impacted in the pacific ocean. The radiation actually emanated from their destruction, showering everything in the deadliest of Weapons grade Baloneum particles. The nuclear reactor was just a clever coverup. The NERV of those guys.

Add warmth in deep cold water and you get sky rocketing growth and your heat exchange fails. Coat your heat exchanger with sufficiently toxic products to prevent growth and you not only limit heat exchange but you also pollute the environment. The commute is now also a huge problem especially in stormy whether, you limit you possible work force to those who will accept being trapped at your whim or the weather's whim. Salt corrosion will occur through out the vessel, water vapour droplets generated through wind turbulence (not evaporation) are very salty (as a result of partial evaporation) and will be a permanent nightmare to block, clean, prevent corrosion.

This has nothing to do with cooling as pumping the water would be car cheaper and everything to do with what is becoming a rather douchy company simply cheating on property taxes. Of course this will blow up in their faces when, it comes to supplying energy to the thing, removing waste especially sewerage, supply fresh water and food, especially during extended inclement weather and one power disruption and profits gone.

Note also I would have to side with coastal inhabitants who complained that they hunk of junk spoiled their view and who demanded a block to the permanent mooring unless it was far enough out to sea not to obstruct or interfere with their view.

If they build the thing around an OTEC [wikipedia.org] power can't be interrupted very easily. And is dirt cheap, only costing them the capital to build the plant. And is renewable and environmentally friendly. Everything else is a solved problem. Ever heard of deep ocean oil platforms? They deal with storms, salt corrosion, and everything else on your list. It's not a nightmare. It just requires engineering that accounts for salt plus ongoing maintenance. There's plenty of experience out there and an extensive bod

You do realise there is a significant amount of difference between an oil platform and it's crew versus a data centre and it's engineers. Between diesel powered drilling equipment and banks of computers. National exclusive economic zones now extend 200nautical miles out and no you can not sit out there and pollute with sewerage. The further out you go the greater the problems. Then of course you data needs to make it way back to shore but now you are importing and exporting data and subject to fees and cha

If you read through the Wikipedia article you quoted [wikipedia.org], you'll learn that OTEC only really works in warm waters, where the heat difference between surface and depth is large enough. The best US location for OTEC is Hawaii, and there's only one functioning OTEC plant in the world, near Japan.
So Google is most likely not building an OTEC plant, or they'd do so in a very different shipyard instead of on Treasure Island.

The construction site doesn't mean all that much. Whatever they're building it's mobile. If it's not self-mobile, it can be moved with tugs. I'm sure they were much more interested in who was doing the building than where. Building structures for long term deep ocean deployment is a solved problem, but you still want to hire a competent shipyard.

This is not the point actually but even if it were - secret is not that the big artificial island is built but what is its purpose. From all the movies I have seen last few decades, this never ends well - the evil starting from the artificial construction destroys civilization leaving small group surviving if at all. That is actually a good solution because it tends to show idyllic surroundings and Tom Cruise (or other Hollywood world savior) with some nice female over a newly born that is a hope for the hu

If it was my project I'd use extendable plastic pipes to circulate the cooling liquid and let the colder sea water carry away the heat. It's certainly more efficient than air, and San Francisco Bay's water is pretty cold to being with. It would take a monumental amount of heat to alter the Bay's ecosystem.

Seems like a big investment to build on a barge that can get swamped by the first storm that comes along.

You then have the problem of power, and communications that have to be fed to the barge. If you run your owngenerators you have a refueling problem, with risk of spill at every refueling.

Once you get out of the bay, you have a police protection issue. Pretty hard to call the cops. Pretty riskyto start shooting at lookie-lews.

You have transport to and from issues as well. And if you think anyone is going to allow you to avoid taxes this way, well good luck with that.

In the first world, this makes no sense, and even the sea water cooling could be accommodated by cheaply laid pipe to land.In the third world, this might make sense, because towed to Africa and guarded by some friendly government youcould use it as a base to handle all your balloon wifi or what ever hair brained scheme you might be planning.

They'll have to sail it around the horn or teleport it because everyone knows they only place to put a floating data centre is at the centre of the Bermuda triangle so that it can take advantage of all the free energy from the astral vortex.

Unlikely they would build it on a barge to operate it in San Francisco bay.It would be way cheaper to build it on land and build a pipe to the bay.

Besides, anyone thinking of pumping massive amounts of heat into the bay is going to find their head meeting a green brick wall in short order.And there would be permits already being filed for such activity.

This thing is going to be towed away somewhere where governments are more cooperative, or have less to say about what is going on.

According to this CBS Local article [cbslocal.com], construction stopped a few weeks ago due to a lack of permits:

The reason: Google does not have a permit for a floating anything.
“Google has spent millions on this,” said an insider close to the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission. “But they can’t park this barge on the waterfront without a permit, and they don’t have one.”
A BCDC official confirmed the agency has held discussions with Google about “hypoth

Four floors, and built out of shipping containers - the dirt-cheap construction option. It isn't actually that big, and a lot of it might be empty space. It may well be a testbed to work on those new-fangled cooling systems, refining the technology. Half the energy cost of a datacenter goes on cooling - it's understandable google might be looking into the idea.

"Half the energy cost of a datacenter goes on cooling" And now the cost will be replaced by a mobile generator or a really long power cord? I think it is obvious that Google is involved, but why jump to conclusions about energy savings? Isn't it more likely that putting a data center on a barge will save real estate costs and property taxes?

Supplying data to a floating center is easy - just a few short undersea fibers and a kevlar rope to support it coming up, no problem. Power, though, you are right - you can't just chuck a power cord in the ocean. Undersea power cables are very expensive. It could well be a tax dodge. Risky, though - spending a lot of money on something that could be regulated to uselessness in a few years.

Isn't it more likely that putting a data center on a barge will save real estate costs and property taxes?

Only if you tow it out of some citie's jurisdiction. Which, requires having a massive fiber-optic cable, and shore support facilities. You can't just go out and anchor some huge barge just anywhere. There are shipping lanes to consider, risks to navigation, 200 mile economic exclusion zone issues.

On the other hand, if Brazil was getting seriously pissed at US Snooping, and insisted that Google either get out of the country or build an in-country data center, this platform could be floated there in two we

Google are outgrowing intercontinental fibre-optic cables. Too expensive, and insufficient bandwidth! Instead, they're implementing an extension of RFC1149 [ietf.org], with the avian carriers replaced with bulk cargo shipping. A station wagon full of tapes has nothing on this!

They wouldn't be pirates at all, they'd be like another nation. Governments could decide to allow them to exchange data or to block everything with import restrictions (or even threaten with war). The datacentre wouldn't be protected by a national government, so they'd have to protect themselves against pirates.

Pretty much the same, on a floating barge here in Portland. Just read an article about it the paper (dead tree version). It's pretty clearly tied to google, that's clear. Also, the registrations of these two barges were a three letter designation and then 0010 and 0011 so there's probably at least one more out there (0001) somewhere and quite possibly at 0000 too.

I would think that rejecting lots of waste heat into San Francisco Bay would require an Environmental Impact Report, as well as approval from the Coastal Commission and probably other government checks. IANALaywer or expert on these things; but just follow the news on things like the remodels of piers in San Francisco and other things that touch the water. If Google somehow manages to be "special" on something like that, well... EVIL!

Although the the heat from some servers would make zero difference given that the ocean currents mix with the entire Pacific Ocean, this is California. Specifically, San Francisco. Last I heard, you need a permit to urinate in SF because the odor could effect air quality and if you can get a piss permit it takes a few years.

According to this CBS Local article [cbslocal.com], construction stopped a few weeks ago due to a lack of permits:

The reason: Google does not have a permit for a floating anything.
“Google has spent millions on this,” said an insider close to the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission. “But they can’t park this barge on the waterfront without a permit, and they don’t have one.”
A BCDC official confirmed the agency has held discussions with Google about “hypoth

How do you get all the network cabling to a floating datacentre? One good gust of wind and the datacentre moves (unless it's like an oil rig, but that doesn't sound like a "floating" datacentre) and the cables stretch and break.

Better to submerge the datacentre. When it's firmly anchored to the seabed it can't move - but it still has all the seawater around it for cooling. You'd probably need something like Stromberg's setup (from 007: The Spy Who Loved Me) in reality, to get peope to & from it.

Containerized servers are old hat, and they don't make a lot of sense under normal conditions. Mobility and redeployment really need to be important goals to justify the compromises.

Containers are roughly 8x8x40, so naively could contain 80x 54u racks, which means up to 2 MW/container. In reality, density probably wouldn't be nearly that high, but probably the better part of 1 MW. Water cooling with aquasar-type heatsinks would be an obvious implementation. The barge looks like a 3x3x2 prism of these co

it's only a matter of time before they get shut down by environmentalists. The problem with using sea water as cooling is that the net result is the warming of the sea water. Even only a few degrees can alter the local ecology. It would be one thing if what they were doing was a net zero effect, but if they are pulling energy off the grid, then they will be putting grid energy into the water as heat, and that is not good...